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Authors: Sheila Kohler
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said.
“What was the Emperor like?” Simone wants to know, turning toward him with interest.
His experience with the Emperor was that of the beloved child of a close and trusted associate. He still remembers waking one night as a little boy in his crib and finding theEmperor leaning over him, giving him his blessing. When Dawit was a child, the Emperor seemed extraordinary, with his small body and big head. He spoke many languages, remembered everyone’s name and what they did and had done. He could be extremely charming. Dawit remembers the sparkle in his eyes.
M. urges him to tell them about the pillows. “It’s a wonderful story. It reminds me of the one Nabokov told me about the matches. The ones which an admiral used to show Nabokov the sea when he was a little boy,” she explains, using her fine hands to show the flat, calm sea and then forming her long fingers into a steeple to show how the admiral placed the matches to show a rough sea. “And then later, when he and his father were running away during the Russian Revolution, they met an old homeless man with a sack around his shoulders, walking across a bridge in St. Petersburg, I think it was. The man asked Nabokov’s father for a match to light his cigarette, and in the flare of the match he saw it was the admiral from long ago.” She knows everyone, has even known Nabokov.
He tells his pillow story, and everyone looks at him with great interest. “What wonderful details,” Simone says, clapping her small hands. “The dangling feet. I knew that Haile Selassie was a small man, but I never realized they would place him up high like that.”
“So that he would appear to be above everyone else,” Dawit says, looking down at her.
Seeing them all turn toward him and watch him in silence with great interest, he is obliged to go on. He feels as he did as a boy at the dinner table, when the grown-ups turnedtoward him with interest and tenderness, encouraging him to speak.
Of course, later, toward the end, it was not clear to him if the Emperor was really aware of the severity of the drought and the terrible famine it caused, he tells them. At that point, in 1974, he was very old and probably senile. Most of the people in his circle were preoccupied, it seemed to Dawit, by protocol and their own status, rather than telling the Emperor what he needed to know for his own and the country’s sake. Dawit tells them he heard stories of people giving themselves up to the Derg, offended that their names had not been called with the other famous ones!
As with the French Revolution, a bad harvest, famine, and rising prices exacerbated what was already a dire situation. Then the military revolted, just as it had long before in 1928 when Haile Selassie came into power. It took control of radio and television, and spread information about vast sums of the Emperor’s money hidden in Switzerland while the people starved.
Simone questions him about his own life there. He feels her move her knee toward his, and he gently presses his leg against hers, smiling with complicity at M. He feels obliged to speak, though he hesitates to tell his terrible tale.
He says he remembers the sudden silence in the streets and looking out the window at the heavily armed troops, the army jeeps everywhere. The atmosphere in the palace was probably much like that in the French court during the Revolution. People had come from all over the country looking for security around the Emperor, still believing he could protect them, despite his age-altered mind, his inability to rule.They slept all over the palace, huddled together in stunned disbelief, as the courtiers fled the sinking ship, going abroad, deserting, trying desperately to save their own skins. Only a few remained loyal in the end. His mother—he says her name, Sarah—was one of them.
He speaks of her dancing on the edge of the precipice, unable to imagine what was up ahead. He tells them the tale he was told by one of the
“What was the Emperor like?” Simone wants to know, turning toward him with interest.
His experience with the Emperor was that of the beloved child of a close and trusted associate. He still remembers waking one night as a little boy in his crib and finding theEmperor leaning over him, giving him his blessing. When Dawit was a child, the Emperor seemed extraordinary, with his small body and big head. He spoke many languages, remembered everyone’s name and what they did and had done. He could be extremely charming. Dawit remembers the sparkle in his eyes.
M. urges him to tell them about the pillows. “It’s a wonderful story. It reminds me of the one Nabokov told me about the matches. The ones which an admiral used to show Nabokov the sea when he was a little boy,” she explains, using her fine hands to show the flat, calm sea and then forming her long fingers into a steeple to show how the admiral placed the matches to show a rough sea. “And then later, when he and his father were running away during the Russian Revolution, they met an old homeless man with a sack around his shoulders, walking across a bridge in St. Petersburg, I think it was. The man asked Nabokov’s father for a match to light his cigarette, and in the flare of the match he saw it was the admiral from long ago.” She knows everyone, has even known Nabokov.
He tells his pillow story, and everyone looks at him with great interest. “What wonderful details,” Simone says, clapping her small hands. “The dangling feet. I knew that Haile Selassie was a small man, but I never realized they would place him up high like that.”
“So that he would appear to be above everyone else,” Dawit says, looking down at her.
Seeing them all turn toward him and watch him in silence with great interest, he is obliged to go on. He feels as he did as a boy at the dinner table, when the grown-ups turnedtoward him with interest and tenderness, encouraging him to speak.
Of course, later, toward the end, it was not clear to him if the Emperor was really aware of the severity of the drought and the terrible famine it caused, he tells them. At that point, in 1974, he was very old and probably senile. Most of the people in his circle were preoccupied, it seemed to Dawit, by protocol and their own status, rather than telling the Emperor what he needed to know for his own and the country’s sake. Dawit tells them he heard stories of people giving themselves up to the Derg, offended that their names had not been called with the other famous ones!
As with the French Revolution, a bad harvest, famine, and rising prices exacerbated what was already a dire situation. Then the military revolted, just as it had long before in 1928 when Haile Selassie came into power. It took control of radio and television, and spread information about vast sums of the Emperor’s money hidden in Switzerland while the people starved.
Simone questions him about his own life there. He feels her move her knee toward his, and he gently presses his leg against hers, smiling with complicity at M. He feels obliged to speak, though he hesitates to tell his terrible tale.
He says he remembers the sudden silence in the streets and looking out the window at the heavily armed troops, the army jeeps everywhere. The atmosphere in the palace was probably much like that in the French court during the Revolution. People had come from all over the country looking for security around the Emperor, still believing he could protect them, despite his age-altered mind, his inability to rule.They slept all over the palace, huddled together in stunned disbelief, as the courtiers fled the sinking ship, going abroad, deserting, trying desperately to save their own skins. Only a few remained loyal in the end. His mother—he says her name, Sarah—was one of them.
He speaks of her dancing on the edge of the precipice, unable to imagine what was up ahead. He tells them the tale he was told by one of the
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